A black conservative's place for independent thinking and common sense -- A little oasis for those who got caught up in the momentum of the civil rights movement, but failed to discern the false from the true

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

It's ridiculous to think that we will ever live to see any significant move towards objectivity or fair reporting on the part of the mainstream media, as long as this media is the property of private companies. After all, why would not these companies benefit from particular goals and agendas, like any other institutions? The country's Founders demonstrated a high regard for the press of their day, perhaps expecting it to play an impossible role. Maybe the spirit of John Peter Zenger still filled their colonial air, as it still informs the thinking of a handful of today's reporters.Columnist Glenn Greenwald writes about journalist David Barstow's report on retired military Generals, who were co-opted by the Pentagon to go on airwaves, during the Bush travesty, posing as "analysts," to make a bogus case for the U.S. attack on Iraq [Salon.com, 4/21/09]. Many of these so-called analysts had undisclosed ties to companies that benefited from policies they defended. Barstow's story, although never denied by any of the principals cited, was suppressed by every major network and cable news show.

Greenwald writes:

By whom were these "ties to companies" undisclosed and for whom did these deeply conflicted retired generals pose as "analysts"? ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN and Fox -- the very companies that have simply suppressed the story from their viewers. They kept completely silent about Barstow's story even though it sparked Congressional inquiries, vehement objections from the then-leading Democratic presidential candidates, and allegations that the Pentagon program violated legal prohibitions on domestic propaganda programs.

The Pentagon's secret collaboration with these "independent analysts" shaped multiple news stories from each of these outlets on a variety of critical topics. Most amazingly, many of them continue to employ, as so-called "independent analysts," the very retired generals at the heart of Barstow's story, yet still refuse to inform their viewers about any part of this story.

Greenwald describes NBC's news anchor Brian Williams' attempts to "contain P.R. damage," as NBC executives sought to downplay their conflicting connections to their "independent analyst" former General Barry McCaffrey. The media bought the war story, as sold by Bush operatives, and then found the people who would help to nurture it further.

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Loss of the Issues & Views website

Due to the fact that the owners of the company that has hosted Issues & Views - The Website, since its creation in 1997, have decided to host only sites in Alaska, the website linked to this blog is probably lost.

Issues & Views - The Website (www.issues-views.com) contained hundreds of articles first printed in the hard copy Issues & Views newsletter (1983 through 2002), along with newer articles composed in the 1990s.

Although the former host has re-directed clicks to the website to this blog, it does not appear that there will be any rescue of the website's files or database. For this reason, surfers looking for issues-views.com are landing on this blog. (The website is currently being cached by Google.)

I have learned that an archived version of the website is available on Wayback Machine. Unfortunately, this last capture was performed in 2008, so it lacks certain minor deletions and editing done in 2009 and 2010. However, anyone searching for a particular article should be able to find it there.

- Elizabeth (issues@issues.cnc.net)

Racism is not "sin"

Over the years, as whites have worked to defend themselves against the charge of "racism," they have validated this slur by giving it greater importance than it deserves, and thereby helped to institutionalize it as the world's greatest "sin." As to genuine sin, harboring negative thoughts concerning some group is much further down the list of human deficiencies than bombing Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden and Hamburg, or hacking to death with machetes the men, women and children of an enemy tribe. Now, those are sins! Seeking to force "diversity" down the throats of an unreceptive segment of society is the religious mission of rabid, agenda-driven ideologues. None of this apparent concern for "social justice" has ever been about virtue. It's about power.

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Jacobs and Potter on the un-American nature of "hate crime" legislation.